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Ulysses vocabulary
1289 vocabulary words, including people, places, music, artists, etc.
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caul
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tags: [anatomy]
► definition
Definition:The amnion which encloses the foetus before birth, especially that part of it which sometimes shrouds a baby’s head at birth (traditionally considered to be good luck). [from 16th c.]
► uses
Uses:
I was born with a caul, which was advertised for sale, in the newspapers, at the low price of fifteen guineas. Whether sea-going people were short of money about that time, or were short of faith and preferred cork jackets, I don’t know; all I know is, that there was but one solitary bidding, and that was from an attorney connected with the bill-broking business, who offered two pounds in cash, and the balance in sherry, but declined to be guaranteed from drowning on any higher bargain.
Charles Dickens. David Copperfield (1850)
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“[...] All it takes to get along in this here man’s town is a little shit, grit and mother-wit. And man, I was bawn with all three. In fact. I’maseventhsonofaseventhsonbawnwithacauloverboth-
eyesandraisedonblackcat-boneshighjohntheconquerorandgreasygreens—” he spieled with twinkling eyes, his lips working rapidly. “You dig me, daddy?”
Ralph Ellison. The Invisible Man (1952)
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Who so is blinded with the caul of beauty, discerns no colour of honesty.
John Lyly. Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit (1578)
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FACE. Yes, and that You were born with a cawl on your head.
DAP. Who says so?
FACE. Come, You know it well enough, though you dissemble it.
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Then he put the blanket over his head like a cowl,
Gabriel García Márquez. One Hundred Years of Solitude, p.283 (1970)
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